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Your Ideas On The Bible?
by shamus 60 Replies latest watchtower bible
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bebu
It is also quite biased. Why does the NT overwhelmingly preserve the work of the Gentile church, while the Jewish-Christian church (who were the real intellectual and religious heirs of Jesus) is represented only by the Epistle of James and whatever remains of the Sayings Gospel Q?
This is surely a created premise. Marxists like Jesus' being blue-collar, but reject him because he didn't go that final step and bring about the political revolution that could have happened. "Religious democrats" think God should have let us take a vote on almost everything, instead of being so unfairly dictatorial in all His dealings with us ("Who does he think he is--God??"). Muslims think that God would never, could never be so unfair to Jesus as to permit his crucifixion--so it didn't happen. Mormons think Jesus must have come to the Americas not long after his resurrection because it would be plainly unfair to keep all the native Americans over here in the dark. Created premises.
Pretty much any ideology, held tightly enough, will produce a real crisis with the God of the Bible. I have learned that I need to lay down those ideologies as the eyepiece I wear to examine the Bible, and pick up the Bible as the eyepiece to examine the ideologies.
A very unpopular opinion here, I'm afraid!! And I will leave further comments to others.
(Terri, thanks for the kind words!)
bebu
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hooberus
If it isn't true then, what is? How much did they know about science in those days, how much did they know about the heavens and the earth? The earth was flat, or did God write that down, or did the old Hebrew write it down because he didn't know any better and nobody else then knew any better?
"He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing." Job 26:7
"It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:" Isaiah 40:22
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aniron
As I said before. I reject the Christian faith on it's own merits, not on the Watchtower organisation.
Which merits are they? That Christian teaching is that you should treat all others as equal. That you should love your neighbour. That you should help the less fortunate. That you live in peace with each other.
To often I hear people condemn the Christian faith, when they really mean "Christian religion". To often I hear people say something about the Christian faith, but it turns out they are talking about a Catholic, Anglican, Baptist, Pentecostal, JW's or whatever teaching. Some Pope, Bishop, Pastor, Vicar, Elder stands up and says something and it becomes a "Christian teaching" without anyone actually saying "Does this match up with what Christ did say or do"
All our thinking on the Christian faith is coloured by some organisation/church whether we like it or not. It is coloured by someones writings that we like. It is coloured by what we have heard preached. Its coloured by how we brought up. I have not met anyone who calls themselves a "Christian" based on their own reading of scripture, free from outside influence. Even now I cannot read scripture without some WT teaching coming into my mind. I have met Catholics who have become Pentecostals, yet still pray to Mary, because they still believe its a "Christian" teaching.
Yes the Christian faith does condemn certain practices, like adultery, fornication, homosexuality, theft, drunkenness. So what!
If you want to practice these things then DON'T BECOME A CHRISTIAN. It's that simple.
If you play a sport and that sport has rules pf play and you keep breaking them, don't expect to be picked for the team.
Speaking to a Pakistani Moslem, work colleague I asked about the Islamic view on homosexuals. According to him any Moslem who was homosexual would not be allowed to associate with other Moslems or attend the mosque. He would be thrown out of the family home. In parts of the Moslem world he could even be put to death, by stoning.
Yet I do not see any great protest against Moslems in Britain or the USA against moslems on this teaching. But if a Christian group does the same thing, all hell breaks lose. They get accused of being intolerant etc.
I sometimes find that those who reject the Christian faith, a bit hypocritical. It seems to have become the fashion to condemn Christianity, because its an easy target, Christians don't fight back. Go to a Moslem country and start condemning Islam and see how far you get.
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Mysterious
Yes the Christian faith does condemn certain practices, like adultery, fornication, homosexuality, theft, drunkenness. So what!
You oversimplify the issue by referring to the "Christian faith" there are many Christian denominations with very differing views. Case in point, homosexuality. Some churches are openly accepting gay ministers, bishops, members, etc. Some (do a search for Fred Phelps) are violently and hatefully opposed.
If you want to practice these things then DON'T BECOME A CHRISTIAN. It's that simple.
If you play a sport and that sport has rules pf play and you keep breaking them, don't expect to be picked for the team.
Yet Christians for the most part believe they are the one true religion. (Perhaps there are some that don't, I'm generalizing). They profess to believe in a God of love and yet it would appear God created a percentage of the population incapable of having the same right to the Christian faith AND having a loving, meaningful relationship that he extended to everyone else. Is that fair, loving or just? I think not.
Speaking to a Pakistani Moslem, work colleague I asked about the Islamic view on homosexuals. According to him any Moslem who was homosexual would not be allowed to associate with other Moslems or attend the mosque. He would be thrown out of the family home. In parts of the Moslem world he could even be put to death, by stoning.
And there are places where a woman could be punished for not wearing a veil, not walking behind her husband, or showing an ankle in public. Does this really justify EVERYONE following these practices?
Yet I do not see any great protest against Moslems in Britain or the USA against moslems on this teaching. But if a Christian group does the same thing, all hell breaks lose. They get accused of being intolerant etc.
There are far more Christians in Britain and the USA than there are Muslims. That makes it a much more visible issue.
I sometimes find that those who reject the Christian faith, a bit hypocritical. It seems to have become the fashion to condemn Christianity, because its an easy target, Christians don't fight back. Go to a Moslem country and start condemning Islam and see how far you get.
I don't "condemn" Christianity, I condemn aspects of it I find hypocritical. I do not accept it as my faith but I respect the right of others to believe it if they want. However I do not think religion should ever be used as a tool of discrimination. (again google Fred Phelps) I hold that there is not one true religion, there is something out there for everyone and no one should force their religion on other people telling them it's the only way to believe. (or else) -
Faraon
My Ideas on the bible follow the following by Robert Ingersoll:
http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/robert_ingersoll/inspiration_of_bible.html
Actually, I have way more than these. He limits himself mostly to the Old Testament. The New and Improved version after Jesus, still needs a lot to be desired.
How could I have been so stupid and gullible for decades?
Faraon
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LittleToe
Like most things in life, you have to apply a little common sense:
Do you really think that the physical construction of a woman is going to make childbirth easy and painless?
Maybe it was just more painful for Eve alone.Do you really think that there was never death before Adam sinned?
What the heck did the animals do to deserve it, then?
Then what kind of death is that text really talking about, then?And so on...
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Leolaia
Do you really think that there was never death before Adam sinned?
What the heck did the animals do to deserve it, then?
Then what kind of death is that text really talking about, then?hehehe, that's a really brilliant point. I can actually answer the latter point for you. The Eden story is an adaptation of an older Near East myth, the closest attested parallel of which is the tale of Adapa and the Southwind. I'll spare you the details but both tales involve food of life, eating food which allegedly brings death, the granting of divine knowledge, and deception by another god. The main difference is that in the Babylonian version, man already has divine knowledge but seeks everlasting life whereas in the biblical version, it is the other way around.
I would say that in the original form of the Israelite myth, death already existed among the lower animals. For man, immortality was a gift from the gods. As long as man ate from the Tree of Life, he would be immortal. However, the gods kept man in his place by denying him divine knowledge. The head of the pantheon would not have it that way because man would become a god if he were both immortal and had divine knowledge. You can have either one or the other, not both. Therefore the gods declared that if man eats from the Tree of Knowledge, he would forfeit his right to eat from the Tree of Life and thereby lose immortality. Then along came a trickster, perhaps wise but jealous of man's immortality, who took advantage of man's gullibility and told him that he was already a god and had every right to eat from the Tree of Knowledge and that once he did, he would realize that he would not lose immortality. Man eats from the tree (perhaps in secret), but once he gains divine knowledge, he realizes that he has been tricked -- he knows who he really is and he cannot hide his newfound wisdom from the other gods; he cannot feign ignorance. He gives himself away (just as Adam and Eve did in the biblical version), and the gods banish him from their divine presence -- denying him the Tree of Life. Thus the trickster succeeds in stripping away man's immortality.
In the biblical primeval narrative (Gen. 2-11), this is but one of several attempts of man trying to attain godlike status. Having intercouse with the gods (ch. 6) was another, and building a tower to reach heaven (ch. 11) was yet another.
Leolaia
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Faraon
Hooberus,
The "Skeptics' Annotated Bible" uses so many poor arguments that it is hard to take it seriously. The following is a response.
Not as the poor arguments of the deists. Especially those based on the bible. SAB's arguments are actually poor because it is a shortened explanation. Pure and to the point. They are based on the King James bible alone. Many more arguments could be used against Christianity if, for example, they would use how "prophecies" have been changed to suit the needs of Christians. Even OT prophecies have failed to come true, or have been written ex post facto. If your god were to be put on trial, he would be sentenced to death on crimes against humanity. I am amazed about how many things SAB has missed, but I know they are getting better all the time. Another thing they have failed to do is to point out to verses that show that the supposed author could not have known, such as names of rivers or cities that did not exist at the time the author lived. How they mistranslated words to suit their purpose such as "virgin" instead of "young woman", etc.
It is amazing how it takes an apologist to give a spin to something that should be very simple to understand.
Faraon
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toreador
If the Bible was meant to be understood, it would have been written much clearer and easier to understand.